I dont pretend to know a lot about European knights, but I heard once that knights were trained very well and the swords we not designed to just crush bones, otherwise I would assume they just would swing baseball bats. The crusaders created this image of the knight by not havnt proper training. Most were not well trained in fighting and would just bash swords with people.

Since I no longer have my reference books, due to a house fire, over 10 years ago.
And I read about the 1000 fold katana's nearly 20 years ago, I have had a look on the 'net to try and find reference to the sword that I originally read about that had been folded 1000 times.

Now the sword I read about was presented to some Japanese Prince around about the 9th century, And I specifically remember reading that it had been folded 1000 times that produced millions of layers.

I do know that the sword in question resides in one of the Tokyo museums, although I'm not sure which one.

I know this is not solid proof but I have found several references to say that katana's were folded upto 1000 times.

2 of the references are from American websites that sell swords, I have read the rules of the forum that request you don't post links to competitors websites, but since these sites are american then I'm hoping the admin will let these "slide" just the once.

Scroll down to where it says "Orchid Daisho"

and it reads "The folded steel blades are made from imported Swiss steel and even though they are highly polished, the nearly 1,000 folds it takes to make this blade are visible".

highlight the link to see..

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on this page scroll down to the small lettering (opposite where it says "swiss army knives" , to left of page)

Again highlight to read...
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Lastly a glossary of sword terms...

Scroll down to katana where it reads...

Traditional long sword of the samurai constructed through the folding and refolding of a bar of hot metal thousands of times.

While most Katana may have been folded upto 25 times, but usually less, Some Katana were folded upto 1000 times.
This constant folding distributed the carbon more evenly alongside its length producing different areas of weakness, strength, flexibility etc.
It also removed air pockets and other stress's that could cause a finished blade to shatter, snap or break upon impact with a target.

I'll try and find the reference to that particular 1000 folded blade that now resides in the tokyo museum, But without my books and a being able to specifically remember the exact details, I'm just going off what I remembered when I read the book 20 years ago.

Admin Edit:

Consider this a warning. If you try and break the rules you will find yourself banned very quickly. Do not do it again.

Oni no Tengu wrote:2 of the references are from American websites that sell swords, I have read the rules of the forum that request you don't post links to competitors websites, but since these sites are american then I'm hoping the admin will let these "slide" just the once.

:tut: trying to bend the rules will not go down well :tut:

1st Site

Oni no Tengu wrote:Scroll down to where it says "Orchid Daisho"

and it reads "The folded steel blades are made from imported Swiss steel and even though they are highly polished, the nearly 1,000 folds it takes to make this blade are visible".

This is about the PC Orchid, the very same one that is on the blades site and I can categorically state that it is not folded thousands of times and that this is a mistake by whoever wrote that site. Where it says "folds" it should say "layers". I.e. 9 or 10 actual folds.

2nd Site: Again it would appear the word "folds" has been used when what was really meant was "layers" - It's a knife company, the only swords they sell are cold steel so I wouldn't use that as "proof".

Oni no Tengu wrote:
Lastly a glossary of sword terms...

Scroll down to katana where it reads...

Traditional long sword of the samurai constructed through the folding and refolding of a bar of hot metal thousands of times.

That's what it says. Not really anything to go on there.

Oni no Tengu wrote:While most Katana may have been folded upto 25 times, but usually less, Some Katana were folded upto 1000 times.
This constant folding distributed the carbon more evenly alongside its length producing different areas of weakness, strength, flexibility etc.
It also removed air pockets and other stress's that could cause a finished blade to shatter, snap or break upon impact with a target.

And that's your opinion. Trying to pass it off as part of the quote? :tut:

Oni no Tengu wrote:I'll try and find the reference to that particular 1000 folded blade that now resides in the tokyo museum, But without my books and a being able to specifically remember the exact details, I'm just going off what I remembered when I read the book 20 years ago.

There may be such a sword but it would be a purely decorational item. Not used and certainly not the norm as I believe you were implying in your previous post.
Do you not concede that maybe, just maybe, the mistake lies in your memory of something you read 20 years ago?

Again, I categorically state that you are speaking out of your rectal cavity.

Some of what you have said here is correct... Allow me to elaborate...

Oni no Tengu wrote:While most Katana may have been folded upto 25 times, but usually less, Some Katana were folded upto 1000 times.This constant folding distributed the carbon more evenly alongside its length producing different areas of weakness, strength, flexibility etc.
It also removed air pockets and other stress's that could cause a finished blade to shatter, snap or break upon impact with a target.

The part I have highlighted is correct. The rest, I can not and will not comment on. (but it seems to me that it could well pass as basic observations).

Essentially the forging process (folding etc) served the purpose of evenly distributing the carbon throughout the steel. It ALSO however served as a method of what is called "stock removal", whereby the smith would start off with an amount of tamahagane/steel much larger in dimensions than the final forged sword. He would hammer and fold and hammer and fold to purge out the impurities within the mix.

Now... given that information... Think on this.....

On page 62 of "the craft of the Japanese sword" by Leon and Hiroko Kapp, with Yoshindo Yoshihara, it states... (and I quote):

"Yoshindo's first choice is always tamahagane, which he feels is easier to forge and produces the best steel for swords. There are large differences in the cost of these materials. Tamahagane costs about $20 per pound; electrolytic iron costs $3 per pound. Sponge iron costs $65 per ton. Since a smith needs 5 or 6 pounds of tamahagane to produce a single pound of sword steel, tamahagane for just a single blade can end up costing as much as $200."

Let's take another look at that shall we.....?

Since a smith needs 5 or 6 pounds of tamahagane to produce a single pound of sword steel,

Some more information taken from page 73 - 74 of the same book.....:

"Yoshindo piles the four pieces of foundation-forged steel on top of each other and, heating and hammering, welds them together. The resultant mass, weighing from 3 1/4 to 5 1/2 pounds, is now hammered out and folded another six or seven times. This second set of folds is called age gitae, or finish forging. Again, aboout half the steel is lost. The result is a steel bar that weighs 2 to 3 1/2 pounds with a carbon content of about 0.7 percent, the optimum as far as Yoshindo is concerned (smiths differ on this; Yoshindo's brother, Shoji, for example, likes his steel to be 0.6 percent carbon).

Most of the carbon in the tamahagane-as much as 0.3 percent-is lost during the first stage of forging, when the pieces of raw steel are flattened, stacked, and hammered together. \each successive fold causes a loss of 0.03 percent as large carbon crystals continue to be broken up. Suppose the starting tamahagane has a carbon content of 1.4 percent. By the time of the first fold, this has already been reduced to 1.1 percent. Thirteen more folds causes a loss of 0.03 percent X 13 = 0.39 percent. This leaves the final steel with a carbon content of about 0.7 percent. At the same time, the hammering and folding has made the carbon distribution more uniform and forced out most of the impurities and slag.

Yoshindo guages all this by eye, examining how the steel looks as it is being worked. There is no prescribed number of folds, although in Yoshindo's case it is usually about thirteen times in all. The steel is ready when it folds continuously with no splitting or cracking visible in the chisel cut. By carefully selecting his pieces of steel in the beginning and when assembling the bar for finish forging, and by observing the steel's behaviour when he heats and hammers it, Yoshindo can produce exactly the type of steel he wants."

Now... I am far too tired and also just can't be bothered to attempt to do the math for this..... BUT.....

Please take into account al the information above....

Think about the amounts of steel and carbon LOST in the forging/folding process......

Now.... your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with a realistic figure of how big a billet the smith would have to start out with AND how high in carbon it would have to be, in order that 987 folds down the line, he is left with enough steel to amount to 3 1/4 to 5 1/2 pounds of the stuff so he may continueon at that point in the forging process......

Please...? I'm ASKING you to do it....?

There is oh so much more..... I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in Japanese swords, sword forging in general or just an appreciation in fine craftsmanship, as it covers the smith, polisher, habaki maker and saya carver with a section for each of them.

Oni...... you're talking sh*te. Face it.

Earlier, I was in an MSN voice conversation with a good friend of mine who is living in Japan at the moment. I have asked him to search up some information regarding this mystery 1,000 "fold" katana in "the museum" in Tokyo.

as do i, hatch... also, and ive checked this. a blade folded more than AROUND 35 times, will not longer have layers. it will become a sold piece of steel again. so after a point, your folding a piece of steel, and layering it, then starting from scratch, over, and over again.

100 folds..... NOT 1000 will produce, from 1 piece of steel....

1'267'650'600'228'229'401'496'703'205'376 layers.....if it did have layers, that is. i believe that if you multiply that to the power of 10, you'l have the '1000 fold layer count'

im gonna email stephen hawkin and ask how you vocalise that number... cus all i can think of is a billion, billion, billion, billion, billion, billion, etc layers. and im sure theres a word for that many numbers.

so with all due respect... what the F*CK are you on about, oni?

with a 1000 folds, you'd be aligning molecules, not counting layers. jesus man... do you need someone to help tie your laces in the morning?

God i LOVE these things.

Im not sure what weapons will be used to fight WWIII, but i know that WWIV will be waged with wooden sticks.

About that suburi, its good to a point.
Becouse if you want to be good at something u have to practice a lot.
In the end we want to have better skills with a katana(or any other sword)
not with a suburi, right ?

a suburi bokken is a usefull training aid to improve muscle memory, and build muscle mass. the problem comes when inexperienced users, try to include them in self training. they become dangerous. there wasa whole thread about them, i'll try find it.

Oni no Tengu wrote:Or performing side kicks or other martial arts moves, or how about a forward or backward roll to escape the blow of a sword...er! never! I think.

Oh sweet baby jesus!
As a student of Kogusoku* (surely you know what that means Oni) Aiki jujitsu, i can tell you right now buster that battlefield combat in your 'light' armour did not involve rolling around and side-kicking the living p!ss out of the enemy. The tare (pleated armoured skirt) would prevent a side kick from being performed to any degree of effectivenss. A straight forward stomp kick to the nads is what was/still is taught in our AJJ system. Rolling around to avoid a sword? and .

Oni no Tengu wrote:There are even reliable sources in japan that have stated that some katana's have cut through as many as 17 human torso's stacked on top of each other (as this was the preferred testing method for katana cutting in feudal japan).

Jesus t*tty f*cking Christ, earth calling Oni, come in Oni!
17 torso's would equate to what? a pile 12ft high at least. 21st century industrial bandsaw might just do it.
The cutting test you pulled outta your ass in probably in reference to one that was called 'splitting the pear' where 2 (not 17) bodies were stacked and the test cut was to slice down the 2 splitting the heads in half.

After my retorts to your posts in the ninja thread, i decided to give you the benefit of the doubt. But you've dug your own grave you fool. No one here is gonna take you seriously now.....and you've only just arrived.

Another question i'd like to ask is:
have you ever had proper tuition in japanese sword arts? Let me take a wild guess.... NOOOooo!
Here's why

Oni No Tengu wrote:Anyway...I started to train with the Ninja-to, from what I'd read, lots of experts in kenjutsu and iaido had stated that learning to draw the sword from its scabbard or saya, was the hardest thing to do, since an incorrect draw could cut straight through the saya and slice into your hand.

If this is the crap you believe then you will surely burn in hell, from all the flaming you will receive in here. Go learn from a teacher, not a dumb book.

You warble on like a 15 year old jedi ninja samurai wannabe. Maybe you'll start flippin' out and do some crazy sh!t.
If you really are the age you say you are, then you have to realise that you've been sussed out and you need to go to the toilet for a sh!t. Cos its coming outta your a*se instead of your mouth!

*Kogusoku = light armour. Its also the system of AJJ i study which pertains to strikes and defences involving the use of the short sword (wakizashi) whilst in combat wearing light armour.

"A man should never have sexual intercourse with another man. God hates that!" Leviticus 18.

Oni no Tengu wrote:There are even reliable sources in japan that have stated that some katana's have cut through as many as 17 human torso's stacked on top of each other (as this was the preferred testing method for katana cutting in feudal japan).

Angelus... apologies for stepping in after you locked it but I gotta set this right.

As most people with any form of interest in Japanese swords will know, on occasion, the number of cadavers cut through during the tameshigiri after a new blade has been made, was inscribed on the tang, amongst other things such as date, smith etc...

As it stands, (if I remember correctly, and I'm pretty sure I do...) the record number of bodies cut through in a single cut is 9.

*has a quick re-think and the number 7 comes to mind but will go with 9 until I look up the book that states the figure.*

Oni..... you're a T.I.T.... plain and simple.

"reliable sources" indeed....

Also... while I'm here....

Oni no Tengu wrote:(as this was the preferred testing method for katana cutting in feudal japan).

Yet again I stand to correct you...

the "preferred method" of testing a sword in feudal Japan was on condemned prisoners. The official tester would use whatever his "signature death cut" was to kill the prisoner. Then the bodies would be arranged either laid across a mound of sand or tied up in a frame, where in both cases, a series of certain cuts would be carried out to test the worth of the sword. Through the hips being the most testing of cuts as the blade needs to go through the most bone in that cut.